aka The Vinyl Villain incorporating Sexy Loser
# 104: Vampire Weekend – ‘The Kids Don’t Stand A Chance’ (XL Recordings ’08)
Good morning friends,
just back from Turkey and I’m gorgeous golden-brown: if you could see me, I’m sure you wanted to dance around me! And for a change: chart band-sound for you today, and I bet you are as astonished as me! Vampire Weekend it is, and I must confess that I liked their early stuff quite a lot, but soon lost interest. Probably a huge mistake, but there you are.
If I remember correctly, Vampire Weekend first came to my attention via the “Contrast Podcast”, which was a fabulous little thing, hosted by the mighty Tim, who now lives right in the Swiss mountains. Tim would announce a theme, you see, and various folk from all around the world then had a week to record a little intro for a song which they thought would fit said theme somehow and Tim would put it all together. All styles were allowed, which made the podcast very interesting indeed. JC and me were regulars back then, so was Matthew from Song from Toad-fame. I do miss the Contrast Podcast, I must say!
Anyway, someone chose Vampire Weekend, until then unbeknownst to me – and they blew me away, you see, because what they did was really new, at least to my ears. I mean, doing style crossovers was a common thing to do for many artists since Stone Age of course, but the styles Vampire Weekend went for, or better: the combination thereof, were extraordinary indeed! Indiepop, Punk Rock, Chamber music (which I know nothing about, I must admit), soukous and Congolese rumba – and let’s be honest: who of you doesn’t like to dance to a good Congolese rumba at times, come on?!).
Now, normally you would think that such a mix is bound to fail, but as we all know the band became the hottest shit whatsoever in 2008, after the release of their debut album. Which had eleven tracks on it, five of which were released as singles in 2007 and 2008. I’m quite sure that even if you remember pretty much nothing else, ‘A-Punk’, ‘Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa’, or ‘Oxford Comma’ will still ring a bell, right? All singles, great ones at that – but typically my favorite one is this, the lesser known of the lot:
mp3: Vampire Weekend – The Kids Don’t Stand A Chance
It was the album closer, which most of the time is not the preferred choice – but hey, I don’t care, I always loved this song. A catchy little tune – and even today I haven’t got a clue what it possibly might be about. Then again: do I want to know? No, because knowing would risk its beauty!
Enjoy,
Dirk
THE NEW VINYL VILLAIN 